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Tuesday, June 30, 2015

NCRI - Some 368 Members of the US House of Representatives have written to President Barack Obama, stressing that any international nuclear deal with the Iranian regime must ensure that international inspectors can visit all Iranian military bases, Rep. Ed Royce, Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee has said.

Mr. Royce, a Republican Congressman from California, told 'Sunday Morning Futures' on FOX NEWS: "So far, Iran has turned down all of the four key objectives that the United States had in this agreement, including having inspectors on military bases and the ability to go anywhere, any time for those international inspectors. That has flatly been turned down by the ayatollah. ... But at the same time, every other key objective has been turned down. The agreement now would apparently lift sanctions at the front end instead of at the back end of the agreement, thus giving Iran an enormous amount of money and the IAEA will not get their 12 questions answered about Iran's ongoing nuclear program, the tests they've already done."

"So this has been quite a blunder so far in terms of our handling of the negotiation on the US side," Mr. Royce said. "The international inspectors apparently will not have the ability to go onto military bases. And this is the same problem we had with the North Korean agreement. In the North Korean agreement, the inability to actually access sites led to North Korea getting a nuclear weapon."

Fox News' senior correspondent, Eric Shawn, told the program: "Despite their protestations of optimism, more potential deal breakers come from Iran's defiant supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. No inspections of military sites, no interviews with Iranian nuclear scientists, no 10 year nuclear restrictions, which, by the way, has already been agreed to. And the lifting of all sanctions immediately when that deal is signed."

"Critics predict that would help Iran further fund terrorism and say the White House needs to heed the warnings of the Iranian opposition, like the group, The National Council of Resistance of Iran, instead of relying on Teheran's claims it does not want to develop a nuclear bomb," he said.

Mr. Shawn pointed out that the June 30 deadline for an international agreement has slipped further back to July 9 when the agreement has to be submitted for Congressional review.

Asked whether a postponement of the deadline for several days would make a difference to the outcome of the talks, Mr. Royce said: "I think this is all the zeal for the deal. We saw the same attitudes in dealing with the North Korean regime at the time."

"The warning signs were there. Without verification, without the ability to have international inspectors go onto those military sites and be able to get the questions answered, without the ability to talk to those Iranian scientists, this deal wouldn't be worth the paper it is written on and the result would be the same as the North Korean agreement," he said.

"So I think now is the time for the United States to push back. The administration has had a warning. I sent a letter, with 367 co-authors on that letter, to the president's desk. That's the vast majority of the House saying the four things that need to be in this agreement, and I detailed them, they're not in that agreement. We need to push back now with the international community and get verification."

WASHINGTON – The United States condemned “in the strongest terms” the terrorist attacks that occurred Friday in France, Kuwait and Tunisia, and following the aggression offered the three countries “any necessary support.”

“Our thoughts and prayers are with the victims of these heinous attacks, their loved ones, and the people of all three countries,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest said in a communique.

Earnest insisted that, as U.S. President Barack Obama told his French, Kuwaiti and Tunisian counterparts over the past few weeks, “we are resolute and united in our shared effort to fight the scourge of terrorism.”

“We stand with these nations as they respond to attacks on their soil today, and we have been in contact with appropriate counterparts in all three countries to offer any necessary support,” Earnest said.

“Terrorism has no place in any society, and the United States will continue to work closely with our international partners to combat terrorist actors and counter violent extremism around the globe,” the spokesman said.

At least 28 people were killed Friday in an attack on the Tunisian tourist resort of Susa, the same day that a suicide bombing against a Shi’ite mosque in Kuwait left at least 25 dead.

Meanwhile in southeastern France, a man was found decapitated at the entrance to a factory where an explosion was caused by a vehicle crashing into several gas cylinders.

GUADALAJARA, Mexico – Gay community organizations of the Mexican State of Jalisco lodged a criminal complaint on Thursday against Cardinal Juan Sandoval Iñiguez for “discrimination and inciting violence” by declaring that same-sex marriages are an “aberration.”

“We are asking he complies with the rule of law. With his statements he is fomenting homophobia and transphobia,” said Carlos Becerra, a member of “Union Diversa,” one of the 12 associations that filed the complaint with the Attorney General of Jalisco.

In a nearly six-minute video released on social networks and the Catholic channel Maria Vision, Sandoval Iñiguez said “according to the Christian revelation,” marriage is between a man and a woman, and that “the rest is deviant.”

“What you get out of this divine institution is an attack against it. It is an aberration and cannot fit in the mind of a Catholic,” he said.

The emeritus Archbishop of Guadalajara lashed out at the Supreme Court of Justice’s decision to declare unconstitutional those state laws that limit marriage to the union between man and woman, and said the highest court always legislates “against morals.”

The organizations that are pressing charges believe that these statements not only discriminate against the gay community, but also violate the Mexican and Jalisco Constitution, Federal Law to Prevent and Eliminate Discrimination, Penal Code of Jalisco and the Act of Religious Associations and Public Worship.

“The cardinal believes marriage between people of the same sex is not a matter of human rights, but human rights are for everyone,” said Becerra.

Although he retired as head of the Archdiocese of Guadalajara in 2011 after 17 years of service, Sandoval Iñiguez has continued to be in news with his strong opposition to abortion and same-sex marriages.

Last week he confirmed to have performed a “great exorcism,” along with other priests in the San Luis Potosi Cathedral, to rid Mexico of the evil that entered it after abortion was decriminalized in Mexico City.

When the Supreme Court in 2010 approved the reforms to the Civil Code of the Federal District to allow same-sex couples to adopt children, the Archbishop said the then head of government of the capital, Marcelo Ebrard, of bribing court ministers.

At least nine people were killed yesterday in different parts of the state, where an attack on a lawyer in Mazatlan stands out.

And a shootout by the Mazatlan-Durango highway that left two injured.In Panuco, a mining businessman and two of his sons became further deaths of the violence plaguing the mountainous area of ​​Concordia.

Where in December 2014 and in April they were also gunned down two of his sons, also engaged in mining activities.The victims were identified as Oscar Fitch Jorge Tovar and his sons Isaac and Heraclius Fitch Rigoberto Valenzuela.

NCRI - Iranian security forces have raided a hotel restaurant and arrested 92 young men and women for eating and drinking ‘in public’ in the month of Ramadan.

The hotel in the northwestern city of Tabriz was raided on Monday. The restaurant manager along with 41 girls and 51 boys were arrested.

Ali Esmaeelpour, a senior state security forces official in the city, confirmed the arrests. Those detained were referred to the regime’s judiciary for sentencing.

Anyone in Iran caught eating or drinking in public during daytime in the month of Ramadan may receive 74 lashes in addition to a jail term of up to two months, judiciary officials of the regime have threatened.

Dadkhoda Salari, the prosecutor general in the city of Kerman, said last week: “Any individual who eats or drinks in public places could face a prison term of from 10 days to two months and 74 lashes,” the state-run Mehr news agency reported.

Another state-run news agency warned the public that special patrols have been stationed at streets and public parks in Tehran during the Ramadan to “deal with” those who drink, eat or smoke in public.

Last year hundreds of Iranians were lashed in public under the medieval laws of the religious dictatorship.

At least 200 people were flogged last year in the Iranian province of Qazvin for eating in public during Ramadan.

Last year Qazvin official Ismail Sadeghi-Niaraki acknowledged the scale of medieval punishments being carried out in the province by the regime under the rule of so-called 'moderate' president Hassan Rouhani.

He said: "[During Ramadan], 400 people were arrested and some were given warnings. Another 200 had their cases reviewed by the judiciary and the flogging sentence was carried out within 24 hours of their arrest."

Last year, a Christian man in Iran had his lips burnt with a cigarette for eating during the day in Ramadan. The savage punishment was carried out in public in the city of Kermanshah.

Wednesday, June 24, 2015

Human rights groups have condemned Saudi Arabia after the beheading of five foreigners this week. Experts warn 2015 will mark a dramatic increase in public executions, as 80 people have already been killed, compared to 88 in the whole of 2014.

Despite mounting international criticism from foreign governments and human rights campaigners, Saudi Arabia has shown no willingness to end public executions. On Monday, a group of five men, sentenced to death for murder and theft, were publicly beheaded.

The killings come about a month after Amnesty International decried what it labeled as a “macabre spike”in state-sponsored executions.

BOGOTA – The Colombian navy seized almost 3 tons of cocaine hidden aboard a small submarine with a four-man crew, which was detected in the Pacific Ocean heading for the border area between Guatemala and Mexico, officials said Tuesday.

Combined investigations by the navy, police and U.S. naval units spotted the drug-traffickers’ sub as it set sail from Sanquianga National Park in the southwestern Colombian province of Nariño, an official communique said.

With the aid of the United States Coast Guard, the 11-meter-long (36-foot-long) by 1-meter-wide (3¼-foot) wide submarine was intercepted in international waters and was found to be carrying 2.8 tons of cocaine.

The part of Nariño from where the small submarine sailed is a stronghold of the Daniel Aldana mobile column of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, which according to the navy collects huge sums of money from drug-traffickers for permission to ship their narcotics through the region, from the inland jungles to the Pacific Ocean.

The four crew members of the sub detained in international waters were handed over to U.S. authorities, the report said

A man was killed by at least four bullets, one in the head, inside the restaurant Miguelito's.

Located next to the market Bodega Aurrera, in the area of ​​Santa Fe, the afternoon of Thursday, June 18.The victim approximately 35 years was carried out by subjects who left abandoned after the crime meters later a car Honda Civic white, to flee on foot.Unofficial data suggest that the deceased brought tucked 9 mm caliber gun and cash.These figures have not been confirmed by the authority.At present, members of the municipal police carried out an operation by land and air to give the suspects.

"Pantera" says the order had come from somewhere chief square.No one knows who, but how murdered.

A nine year old boy that he must have been commissioned.Nobody kills a little kid on their own, because that is punishable with the death of the gunman and any member of your family.That can almost swear it was a given in a moment of anger order.

He had touched him, but "Pantera" -23 years, thin, shaved head, then "donkey" [charge of moving drugs from one point to another] Los Zetas with aspirations vice sicario- was going to Morelos instead to be in his home in Tezontle, Hidalgo.

Tuesday, June 23, 2015

NEW YORK – DNA tests performed on items found at an upstate New York hunting cabin came back positive for the two convicted murderers who escaped from prison two weeks ago, the local press reported Monday.

Forensic evidence found at the cabin – located 24 km (15 mi.) from the prison – indicates that the two convicts had been at the cabin within the last 48 hours. Authorities found prison-issue underwear belonging to one of the two men at the site, according to investigators cited by The New York Times.

David Sweat and Richard Matt escaped from the Clinton penitentiary near the Canadian border on the night of June 5-6, and since then hundreds of local, state and federal police have been searching for them.

The cabin is located in Mountain View, a forested and remote area, and the finding of items linked to the two men there brings the focus of the search back to the vicinity of the prison after on the weekend authorities had expanded the search area to more than 480 square kilometers (185 square miles).

New York State Police Maj. Charles Guess said Monday at a press conference that unspecified items were recovered at the hunting cabin and sent to a laboratory for DNA testing, but he did not confirm at the time whether or not the results came back positive.

Sweat, 35, was serving a life sentence without parole for killing a sheriff’s deputy in 2002, and Matt, 48, was sentenced to 25 years behind bars for kidnapping and killing his former boss in 1997.

The pair fled the prison after breaching the walls of their cells and moving through a tunnel and internal passageways until they came to a sewage pipe that led outside the facility.

On June 12, a female prison staffer admitted to police that she had helped the two inmates with their escape whereupon she was arrested and is facing multiple charges and a maximum prison term of seven years.

Joyce Mitchell, 51, confessed to investigators that she offered the two prisoners access to a cell phone and smuggled tools to them, as well as making efforts to have a vehicle ready for them to use when they escaped.

Monday, June 22, 2015

BUENOS AIRES – A 97-year-old Supreme Court judge criticized by the government of Argentine President Cristina Fernandez for remaining on the bench despite his advanced age, said that he “will not give up,” in a letter sent to the country’s Catholic primate.

In the missive, the contents of which were published Tuesday by the daily La Nacion, Carlos Fayt told Cardinal Mario Poli that he “will continue fulfilling in the best way” his “earthly destiny.”

Poli, the successor to Jorge Bergoglio – who became Pope Francis – as archbishop of Buenos Aires, had sent the judge a message in May, the contents of which were made public last weekend, in which he said that the attacks against him “harm the constitutional order.”

The cardinal was referring to the government’s attempts to oust Fayt from his post on the grounds that he is not able to properly fulfill his court duties because of his age and health situation.

In his written response, dated June 5, Fayt thanked Poli and said that “work, in any of its forms, is the main way of acknowledging the dignity of people and age – specifically – is not harmful to that dignity.”

“Pope Francis asked us elderly people, from his heart, not to give up. Encouraged by the words of His Eminence and encouraged by an honorable life, I can say with pride: Here I am!” Fayt wrote.

MONTERREY, Mexico – Three women and a man were murdered in a poor neighborhood controlled by gangs in Monterrey, the capital of the northern Mexican state of Nuevo Leon, a State Investigations Agency, or AEI, spokesman said.

The female victims, one a minor and another possibly pregnant, were shot dead on Saturday, while the man had his throat cut, the AEI spokesman told Efe.

“Reports were received that three women had been found dead inside a house and a man was outside” the property, the AEI spokesman said, adding that the killings occurred in the Colonia Independencia section of Monterrey.

Colonia Independencia, which borders the first district of Monterrey, is home to a shantytown where at least 20 gangs with links to drug cartels operate.

The weekend started in Nuevo Leon with the killings of 10 people on Friday at a beer distribution center in Garcia, a city in the Monterrey metropolitan area.

Seven of the victims were pronounced dead at the scene and three others died while being transported to hospitals.

“(The) evidence has let us pursue a line of investigation that considers this an attack by an organized crime group,” Nuevo Leon Attorney General Javier Flores said.

The killings at the beer distribution center are the worst attack by drug gangs in the Monterrey metropolitan area in a year.

Monterrey has been plagued by drug-related violence in recent years, with the worst incident occurring on Aug. 25, 2011, when Zetas cartel members set fire to a casino in the industrial city, killing 52 people

MEXICO CITY – Mexican immigration officers rescued 6,733 minor illegal immigrants from human traffickers who had promised to deliver them to their families in the United States.

The National System for Integral Family Development, DIF, and the National Institute of Migration, INM, said in a joint statement Sunday, the rescued children were mostly from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador.

They said they have implemented common strategies to protect the rights of children and adolescents during their stay in the country after INM rescued them from irregular routes used by traffickers, where they were exposed to different kinds of abuse including forced labour, rape, physical and verbal assault.

Upon rescue, the children were immediately sent to state and municipal DIF systems for protection and specialized care.

Consular representatives are verifying their nationalities from their countries of origin, to reunite them with their families.

The state and municipal DIF systems have specialized staff including physicians, psychologists and social workers to attend to all children and adolescents in the shelters.

According to immigration authorities, a total of 11,893 children, 8,060 male and 3,833 female, from the above mentioned countries have been rescued so far this year.

Of the rescued, 4,029 were aged between 0 and 11 years of age and 7,864 were between 12 and 17 years.

The statement said from January to May 2013, INM rescued 3,496 foreign minors while in 2014 the corresponding figure was 8,003.

Sunday, June 21, 2015

NCRI - Anyone in Iran caught eating or drinking in public during the days in the month of Ramadan may receive 74 lashes in addition to a jail term of up to two months, a high ranking judiciary official of the Iranian regime has threatened.

Dadkhoda Salari, the prosecutor general in the city of Kerman said on Friday: “Any individual who eats or drinks in public places could face a prison term of 10 days to two months and 74 lashes,” the state-run Mehr news agency reported.

Another state-run news agency warned the public that special patrols have been stationed at streets and public parks in Tehran during the holy month of Ramadan to deal with those who drink, eat or smoke in public.

“The police will deal with those individuals who smoke, drink water and other liquids, eat a snack or food in public,” the state-run ISNA news agency reported.

Last year hundreds of Iranians were lashed in public under the medieval laws of the religious dictatorship which can sentence offenders to 74 lashes and two months in prison for eating during Ramadan.

At least 200 people were flogged in last year in the Iranian province of Qazvin for eating in public during Ramadan.

In 2014, Qazvin official Ismail Sadeghi-Niaraki acknowledged the scale of medieval punishments now being carried out within the regime under the rule of so-called 'moderate' president Hassan Rouhani.

He said: "Exceptional measures were taken by the judiciary in Qazvin province during the month of Ramadan to deal with those eating in public.”

"Over this period, 400 people were arrested and some were given warnings. Another 200 had their cases reviewed by the judiciary and the flogging sentence was carried out within 24 hours of their arrest."

Last year, a Christian man in Iran was sentenced to have his lips burnt with a cigarette for eating during the day in Ramadan. The savage punishment was carried out in public in the city of Kermanshah.

Saturday, June 20, 2015

Iranian women are becoming more vocal and determined in their efforts to overcome “misogynist” laws in Iran under the mullahs’ rule, an official of the Iranian Resistance has said.

Mrs. Houri Seyyedi, discussed the situation of women’s rights in a live Question and Answer session on Friday broadcast on women.ncr-iran.org (NCRI Women’s Committee), with international journalists and rights activists posing questions via Twitter.

“The suppression of women by the misogynist regime in Iran has in many instances become institutionalised”.

“Restrictions are imposed on women, even in their private lives and in the manner that they choose to dress. They are sidelined from work places and there is gender inequality in places of education including universities and government buildings. They are denied an active presence in educational, cultural and arts centres, and Iranian female singers are not allowed to perform.”

“There is constant harassment of women by the so-called anti-vice patrols, and arbitrary and unlawful arrests of women. There have even been cases of acid attacks on the faces of women on the bogus charge of mal-veiling. Even in their homes, women are denied basic rights, and face violence and harassment, and women are denied custody of their children in cases of divorce.”

“In the past 10 years more than 30,000 women have been arrested for so-called mal-veiling. More than 7,000 women have been forced to give written pledges to conform to the Islamic veil. At least 4358 women have had their files sent before the judiciary."

Mrs. Seyyedi said that despite promises of moderation by Hassan Rouhani, the rate of executions in Iran has increased at a soaring rate since he became president.

"However, Iranian women are fighting against this regime and its misogynist laws and they are resisting in different forms. They have no hopes on any reforms from within the regime. They are determined to bring about change themselves. For example they are resisting against the restrictions and misogynist laws imposed on them in carrying out or even watching sports matches."

Asked why the regime was preventing women to attend sports stadiums to watch matches, Mrs. said the regime was fearful that the scene could quickly transform into a political protest.

“Since misogyny is a key element of the fundamentalist regime, the women’s protests quickly become deeply political and attack the regime in its entirety.”

GENEVA – A total of 21.1 million Yemenis, 80 percent of the population, are in urgent need of humanitarian assistance, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, or OCHA, warned on Friday.

“We’re facing a humanitarian crisis,” OCHA spokesman Jens Laerke said during a press conference, adding “the public services are collapsing in all regions of the country.”

Meanwhile, World Food Program, or WFP, spokeswoman Elisabeth Byrs said that more than 6 million people suffer from severe food insecurity and are “in need of immediate humanitarian assistance.”

According to this figure, one in every five Yemenis needs urgent help, she explained.

At the end of 2014, people suffering severe food insecurity numbered 3.4 million, an enormous amount, Byrs added.

The WFP has managed to distribute food to 1.7 million people in 11 regions in recent weeks, but Byrs said that it is a fraction compared to the number of those in need of help.

World Health Organization, or WHO, spokesman Christian Lindmeier said that the rate of people being treated in hospitals for malnutrition has increased by 150 percent.

Lindmeier also added that 53 health facilities, including 17 hospitals, were no longer in service, while the main operating center, where most of the surgical emergencies in Sana’a were performed, has been destroyed.

More than 15 million people, including a million displaced, require urgent health services, the UN official pointed out.

Yemen has been the epicenter of political unrest since 2011, worsened last September when the Houthi rebels launched their armed uprising.

The Shiite group gained control of the capital in February, forcing Yemeni President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi into exile in Saudi Arabia.

In late March, Saudi Arabia formed an Arab coalition to launch airstrikes in Yemen, causing more than 2,600 deaths, half of whom were civilians, and huge damage to infrastructure.

ST. PETERSBURG, Russia – Russian President Vladimir Putin accused the United States on Friday of making global decisions that will push the world into an arm race, and possibly result in a new cold war.

“It’s not local conflicts but global decisions such as the U.S. unilateral withdrawal from the ABM (Anti-Ballistic Missile) Treaty that lead the world to local conflicts,” Putin said replying to a question at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum.

“It is really a step which is pushing all of us to a new spiral of the arms race because it changes the global security system,” Putin said.

The Russian president also said that “wherever regional conflicts break out, the parties in conflict always inexplicably find weapons,” which could be equally applied to Ukraine’s eastern provinces, according to Putin.

Putin also highlighted that after the collapse of the Soviet Union “several of our partners in the West, including the United States first and foremost, came under euphoria and instead of setting up good neighborly and partner relations, they began grabbing free geopolitical space as they saw it.”

The Russian president claimed the problem with the United States is that it tries to impose standards and decision regardless of Russia’s position of common interests.

In practice, the United States is telling Russia that it knows what is best for it, according to Putin, who said that Russia determines its own needs and interests according to its history and culture.

Friday, June 19, 2015

‘The entry of women at volleyball matches is forbidden,’ an official of the Iranian regime’s volleyball federation said on Friday, state-run ISNA news agency reported.

As part of the International Volleyball Federation’s (FIVB) 2015 World League, a match between Iran and the United States is scheduled to be held in the Azadi Sports Complex in Tehran on Friday.

The Iranian regime previously prohibited women from attending an international men’s volleyball match in June 2014, in contravention of the principle of gender non-discrimination in sports.

State-run ISNA news agency reported on June 17, 2015 that a source inside Iran’s volleyball federation had confirmed that the “entry of all women to the Azadi Sports Complex during the World League matches has been prohibited.”

In November 2014, the International Federation of Volleyball (FIVB) sanctioned Iran from hosting international events for as long as women are not allowed to watch games.

A spokesman for the international federation told AFP on 9 November 2015 that the FIVB will "not give Iran the right to host any future FIVB directly controlled events such as World Championships, especially under age, until the ban on women attending volleyball matches is lifted".

"This does not include other volleyball tournaments or next year's World League tournament because the fixtures are already confirmed," the spokesman added.The Iranian regime’s then police chief General Esmail Ahmadi Moghaddam said in June 2014 "we cannot allow the presence of women in stadia" because gender mixing "is not yet in the public interest".

The current Iranian regime’s police chief said on Thursday his forces have acted based on their natural duty in banning the entrance of women into sports stadiums or cancelling various music concerts.

The commander of the police Hossein Ashtari said in a trip to Qom: If we prevent the presence of women in concerts and sports stadiums, we are acting based on our natural and sharia duty,” the state-run Entekhab website wrote.

MEXICO CITY – A police officer disappeared following a shootout in Apatzingan, a city in western Mexico, where gunmen murdered two other officers and five civilians, Michoacan Gov. Salvador Jara said.

Officers assigned to guard the La Fortaleza de Annunaky ranch failed to return when expected, prompting their commander to send out a patrol car to search for them, Jara said.

The patrol car met up with the other officers halfway to the ranch and the three patrol cars headed back to town.

The officers came across a tractor-trailer loaded with scrap metal and an SUV.

“When they found these two vehicles, the patrol cars started to pass them and that’s when they were attacked by armed men. There is a shootout and they (the officers) head off, find a motorcycle rider and that’s how they sent word (to other officers),” the governor said.

The shootout was over quickly and the gunmen torched one of the patrol cars, “but they didn’t realize that reinforcements were coming,” Jara said.

Officers killed the tractor-trailer’s driver, his assistant and three other civilians, the governor said.

Investigators have not determined whether the men belonged to a criminal organization, Jara said, but he indicated that they may have been members of the Caballeros Templarios drug cartel.

The La Fortaleza de Annunaky ranch belonged to Caballeros Templarios boss Nazario Moreno, who died in a shootout with marines on Jan. 9, 2014.

According to the report of Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA), Davud Nemati, one of his friends has published this news and written: “A man named as Hamidi said he has been arrested because of shaking hands with his client which has been written in the record as ‘adultery’.”

Mr. Moghimi has informed Mr. Nemati of these through a phone call from Rajai Shahr Prison and has also told that a bail of 20 million Thomans has been issued for him and hopefully he is going to be released soon.

Mohammad Moghimi is a human rights lawyer and his client, Atena Farghdani has been recently sentenced to 12 years of imrisonment for her peaceful activities.

Sunday, June 14, 2015

SAN JUAN -- A Puerto Rico Superior Court Judge was sentenced to 10 years in prison today after being convicted earlier this year of accepting bribes to acquit a businessman of vehicular homicide charges. Assistant Attorney General Leslie R. Caldwell of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division and U.S. Attorney Rosa Emilia Rodríguez-Vélez of the District of Puerto Rico made the announcement.

In January, a federal jury convicted Judge Manuel Acevedo-Hernandez, 63, of Aguadilla, Puerto Rico, of conspiracy to commit federal programs bribery and receipt of a bribe by an agent of an organization receiving federal funds. Chief U.S. District Judge Aida M. Delgado of the District of Puerto Rico imposed the sentence.

Acevedo-Hernandez presided over the trial of Lutgardo Acevedo-Lopez, 39, a certified public accountant in Aguadilla, Puerto Rico. Acevedo-Lopez was charged with criminal vehicular homicide based on his role in a June 2012 collision involving the vehicle he was driving and another car, which resulted in the death of the other driver.

According to the evidence presented at trial, Acevedo-Lopez used an intermediary to bribe Acevedo-Hernandez by paying taxes owed by Acevedo-Hernandez; paying for the construction of a garage for Acevedo-Hernandez’s home; and providing Acevedo-Hernandez with a motorcycle, clothing and accessories, including cufflinks and a watch. In exchange, Acevedo-Hernandez acquitted Acevedo-Lopez of all charges.

In August 2014, Acevedo-Lopez pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit federal programs bribery and to paying a bribe to an agent of an organization receiving federal funds. Acevedo-Lopez has not yet been sentenced.

The case was investigated by the FBI’s San Juan Division. The case was prosecuted by Trial Attorneys Peter Mason and Menaka Kalaskar of the Criminal Division’s Public Integrity Section and First Assistant U.S. Attorney Timothy Henwood and Assistant U.S. Attorney Jose Capó of the District of Puerto Rico.

MEXICO CITY – A 19-year-old Russian woman confessed that she murdered her mother and 12-year-old sister, whose dismembered bodies were found at their house in Tijuana, a border city in northwest Mexico, media reports said.

Anastasia Lechtchenko Masney, who was the prime suspect in the murder case, was found and arrested in Sinaloa, another northwestern state.

The teenager confessed that she beheaded and dismembered the bodies, removing the heart from one body and the eyes from the other.

The suspect told investigators she flushed the body parts down the toilet because she believed her mother and sister were witches.

The dismembered bodies of Yulya Masney Safonchik, a 42-year-old Russian-born Mexican citizen, and her daughter, Valeria Lechtchenko Masney, were found last week inside a house in Tijuana, located near San Diego, California, the Baja California Attorney General’s Office said.

Anastasia Lechtchenko Masney lived at the house with her mother and sister, but she was not home when AG’s office agents went to the property.

Investigators launched a search for the teenager, the AG’s office said.

The suspect often disappeared from home and was reported missing several times to authorities by relatives who feared that people traffickers had abducted her.

Authorities, however, determined that she had left of her own will and had drug problems.

WASHINGTON – The Pentagon considers sending up to 5,000 soldiers, heavy artillery and tanks to Eastern Europe in response to Russian support for Ukrainian separatists, the New York Times said Saturday.

If carried out, this will be the first time since the Cold War that the United States sends mechanized infantry to NATO’s extended borders in Eastern Europe as a dissuasive power.

It would also be the most serious step taken as yet by the United States in response to Russia’s annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula and Moscow’s support for pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine, a country long in the realm of Russian influence but which since 2014 has been strengthening its bonds with the West.

NATO has already stepped up military exercises on its eastern borders and has expanded surveillance by air and sea.

Since NATO extended its borders in 2004 to include the Baltic republics – Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania – the United States has avoided making any permanent deployment in the area bordering on Russia.

The level of troops and military equipment being considered would be similar to the amount kept for a decade in Kuwait following the Iraqi invasion that led to the first Gulf War in 1990, the newspaper said.

The proposal, a symbol of the commitment to the collective defense of NATO countries, must be approved by Defense Secretary Ash Carter with the support of U.S. President Barack Obama.

This go-ahead could come before the meeting of NATO defense ministers in Brussels at the end of this month.

Some European partners have been reticent during the crisis to enter into such mobilizations, which could push Russia to an escalation of its role in the conflict.

TIJUANA, Mexico – The dismembered bodies of a Russian immigrant woman and her 12-year-old daughter were discovered inside a home in this northwestern Mexican city, the Baja California state Attorney General’s Office said.

The bodies of Yulya Masney Safonchik, 42, and Valeria Lechenko Masney were discovered Wednesday night by police responding to a complaint from neighbors about a foul smell coming from the family’s home in the Playas de Tijuana neighborhood.

Homicide detectives found the victims’ remains stuffed into plastic bags.

The killings would have taken place on Tuesday, Gonzalez Martinez said, adding that Valeria’s older sister and the girls’ father were being interrogated.

Investigators have found evidence that the older daughter, who was not at the residence when the bodies were found, might have been involved in the crime, the prosecutor said.

Authorities eventually located the older daughter with several friends, who were also detained briefly until investigators were satisfied that they were not connected to the double-murder.

The older daughter has a history of substance abuse and the family had reported her missing on several occasions, Gonzalez Martinez said.

The girls’ father, also a Russian immigrant, told interrogators he did not live with Yulya and his daughters and that he only came to the house Wednesday night because neighbors informed him about the police activity at the residence, the prosecutor said.

Saturday, June 13, 2015

Most people would wish that President Obama succeeds in striking a deal with Iran that will see it shut down its nuclear centres, halt uranium enrichment and give up permanently the goal of obtaining a nuclear weapon. Iran however has shown next to no signs that it will forgo its nuclear weapons program. What most of us don't know is how ordinary Iranian citizens opposed to the mullahs' regime would feel about a "bad deal" that would see Tehran cheat its way to the bomb as it stalls world powers.

Amineh Qaraee, 34, and her brother Ehsan, 28, who fled the mullahs' persecution to Norway four years ago, have a striking story. As children, they witnessed their parents’ arrest and imprisonment for supporting the People’s Mojahedin Organization (PMOI/MEK), the main moderate Muslim group opposed to Khomeini’s theocratic rule.

"When I was just one-year-old my father got arrested, and two months later my mother got arrested with me and they took us to prison. There I had to live between people who got arrested and tortured just because they wanted freedom", Amineh recounts in a moving video testimonial.

"I spent some months in prison until they let my mother deliver me to my grandparents. My mother was in prison for more than two years and my father for four years."

Soon after his release, Amineh’s father, a teacher by profession, was again arrested for his political opinions.

"Finally they informed us that they had killed my father and 30,000 other political activists even though all of them were sentenced to some years in prison, not execution”, she adds before breaking down into tears. This has prompted them to join the cause of supporting human rights and democratic change in Iran through different activities, including promoting petitions and other initiatives through facebook,twitter and youtube.

The Qaraees are not the only families of victims of the mullahs left to deal with the torment of losing their loved ones. The Tehran regime has executed more than 120,000 political prisoners, mostly MEK supporters, in the past 36 years. Their families who live in daily agony number in the millions. An overwhelming majority of Iranians have been harmed or affected in some form by the regime in its 36-year rule.

A robust, strong deal with strong inspection regime will manifest Ayatollahs’ weakness and strategic deadlock and embolden Iranian people for their rights. Yet, like many other Iranians opposed to the regime, Amineh and Ehsan are nervous that a “bad nuclear deal” allowing Tehran to go nuclear while duping the West would strengthen the regime. Such an outcome will lead to the situation where the Revolutionary Guards would feel strengthened and would suppress any dissent with even greater brutality. The world would then become silent in the face of all the crimes of this regime.

As the 30 June deadline for a nuclear deal between Tehran and the P5+1 world powers draws closer, most of Iran’s neighbours are also wary that Tehran would make a false pledge to forgo its uranium enrichment for weaponization in return for having international sanctions lifted, and all the while secretly building its nuclear weapon. Rightly so.

Former Iranian President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani is on record as having said in the early 1990s that if Iran succeeded in obtaining a nuclear bomb, no one would be able to stop it from exporting its Islamic revolution.

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has made no secret of Tehran’s military, financial and logistical support to keep Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad in power. Photographs of Iran’s senior Revolutionary Guards Qods Force commanders are intentionally published in state media to show the regime’s military presence in Iraq.

Iran’s Arab neighbours and Israel fear that a nuclear bomb would make Iran the region’s undisputed hegemon with a keen desire to expand its borders.

The concern over Tehran’s abysmal human rights record is shared by many of our allies in Europe.

Last week, in a statement signed by over 220 members of the European Parliament, representing all political groups in the Parliament from the European Union’s all 28 member states, European lawmakers slammed Iran’s gross human rights violations and called on Iranian regime to “end the executions, free political prisoners, stop the repression of women and respect the rights and freedoms of the Iranian people.” The statement infuriated Tehran.

Amineh and Ehsan plan to join Iranian expatriates in a grand rally 13 June in support of democratic change by the main opposition coalition National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI). The council, led by its charismatic President-elect Maryam Rajavi, has a 10-point platform calling for a democratic pluralistic republic based on universal suffrage, freedom of expression, abolition of torture and death penalty, separation of religion and state, a non-nuclear Iran, an independent judicial system, rights for minorities, peaceful coexistence in the region, gender equality and commitment to Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Some 100,000 people took part in a similar rally last year.

The rally will also draw several hundred international lawmakers, personalities and former officials of both Democrat and Republican administrations, who support Maryam Rajavi’s platform. There will be a strong show from parliamentarians of Arab countries who ardently support a change of regime in Tehran that would transform their Shiite neighbour into a peaceful partner. Parliamentary delegations from across Europe will also be present to support the call for democracy.

According to Amineh, "The huge gathering in Paris on June 13 introduces the alternative to the rule of mullahs in Iran.”

“We can learn from the history that our resistance and its members, who have made so many sacrifices to bring about freedom and democracy to Iran, and we won’t stop until we achieve these goals”, Ehsan says. This is a struggle that the world community should support, or else the whole world will be held to ransom by the criminal mullahs with nuclear weapons.

It is only prudent for the West to listen to Iranian dissidents as well in formulating a sound policy on Iran. As a human rights researcher I shall be attending the rally which will be broadcast live.

Tanter, a professor emeritus, University of Michigan, is president of the American Committee on Human Rights.